A fresh study from the University of Missouri School of Medicine has found something new about our bodies.
It’s the first time scientists have shown in humans that changing our habits for a short while can change how our blood vessels respond to insulin, a hormone that helps control blood sugar.
It also shows for the first time that men and women react differently to these changes.
The Problem with Vascular Insulin Resistance
Something called ‘vascular insulin resistance’ is a problem often seen in overweight people and those with type 2 diabetes. It can lead to blood vessel disease.
How the Study Was Done
In the study, scientists looked at 36 young, healthy men and women. For 10 days, they made two big changes to their lives: they cut down their walking from 10,000 to 5,000 steps a day and drank six cans of sugary soda a day.
“We know that women who haven’t gone through menopause get insulin resistance and heart disease less often than men.
But we wanted to see how men and women would react to less exercise and more sugar in their diets for a short time,” said Dr. Camila Manrique-Acevedo, a medical professor.
What Did They Find Out?
The results were interesting. Only men did less exercise and more sugar lead to lower insulin-stimulated blood flow in the legs and a drop in a protein called adropin. Adropin is important because it helps control how sensitive our bodies are to insulin.
It’s also an important sign of heart disease.
“These findings highlight a difference between men and women in how vascular insulin resistance develops when adopting a lifestyle high in sugar and low in exercise,” said Dr. Manrique-Acevedo.
“This is the first time we’ve seen in humans that vascular insulin resistance can be caused by short-term bad lifestyle changes.
It’s also the first time we’ve seen a difference between men and women in how vascular insulin resistance develops, linked with changes in adropin levels.”
What’s the Next Step?
Dr. Manrique-Acevedo says she wants to look at how long it takes to undo these changes in blood vessels and metabolism.
She also wants to study more about how gender plays a role in the development of vascular insulin resistance.
This study was recently published in the Endocrinology journal.
If you care about diabetes, please read studies that flaxseed oil is more beneficial than fish oil to people with diabetes, and Stanford study finds drug that prevents kidney failure in diabetes.
For more information about diabetes and health, please see recent studies about the normal blood sugar for people with diabetes, and heavy cannabis use may decrease the incidence of diabetes.
The study was published in Endocrinology.
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